Ludwig Sander (1906-1975)

Ludwig Sander was exposed to art at any early age, through visits to the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Having studied architecture and architectural drawing in high school, he entered New York University in 1924, but left two years later to become a painter. In 1927, he took a four-month trip to Europe, returning to New York for independent study with Alexander Archipenko, before entering the Art Students League in 1928.

The artist and instructor Vaclav Vytlacil encouraged Sander to study with Hans Hoffman in Munich, which he did in 1931. Hoffman influenced Sander to break away from the more conventional notions of figural and landscape drawing. After returning from Europe, he began painting in a referential abstract style that served as a precursor for his later and more widely known geometric work.

In 1943, he enlisted in the U.S. Army, working in the German Intelligence section in Europe and achieving the rank of staff sergeant. He resumed his art practice in New York after the war, and in 1949, co-founded “The Club” - an association and discussion group for artists in New York, whose 16 members included: Willem de Kooning, Franz Kline, Al Reinhardt, Conrad Marca-Relli, and Jack Tworkov. Among The Club’s several non-artist members was Leo Castelli, who ran one of the most successful galleries in New York during the latter half of the 20th century. In 1951, Castelli curated the now-famous “Ninth Street Show,” in which Sander participated - the first public presentation of the group of abstract artists that would come to be known as the New York School. Sander was also affiliated with the “Tenth Street Galleries,” an artist-run cooperative of galleries that operated mostly out of the East Village during the 1950s and 60s.

Sander completed his bachelor of arts degree from New York University in 1952, and would go on to teach intermittently throughout his career at institutions such as the Art Students League, the Colorado Springs Fine Arts Center, and Bard College. In 1968, he received a grant from the National Council on the Arts and was awarded the prestigious Guggenheim Foundation Fellowship. Sander exhibited extensively with some of the most prominent gallerists of the 20th century, and his work can be found in many private and public collections around the world, including the: Metropolitan Museum of Art, Whitney Museum of American Art, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Aldrich Museum of Contemporary Art, Museum of Fine Arts (Boston), Corcoran Gallery of Art, Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Baltimore Museum of Art, Art Institute of Chicago, Walker Art Center, The Modern (Fort Worth), and the Blanton Museum of Art at the University of Texas at Austin.

Source: Stan Cuba, Associate Consulting Curator, Kirkland Museum of Fine & Decorative Art